Report: NFL should’ve done more with Ray Rice probe

Associated Press

Published
6:11 pm CST, Thursday, January 8, 2015

NEW YORK — The NFL failed to investigate the Ray Rice case properly, former FBI director Robert S. Mueller said in a report that also said he found no evidence the league received a video of the Ravens running back knocking out his fiancée in a casino elevator.

“The NFL should have done more with the information it had and should have taken additional steps to obtain all available information about the Feb. 15 incident,” Mueller said in a statement after releasing his 96-page report.

Mueller said he can find no evidence the league received the video showing Rice striking his fiancée before it was published online in September. A law enforcement official showed the Associated Press videos of the incident and said he mailed a DVD to NFL headquarters in April.

The report said a review of phone records and emails of NFL employees showed no evidence that anyone in the league had seen the video before Commissioner Roger Goodell initially suspended Rice for two games. Rice was then indefinitely suspended and released by the Ravens, but his suspension was overturned and he’s currently a free agent.

The private investigation, without subpoena power, did not include any contact with the law enforcement official who showed the AP the videos. The officer played the AP a 12-second voicemail from an NFL office number dated April 9, in which a woman verifies receipt of the DVD and says: “You’re right, it’s terrible.”

The official, who insisted on anonymity because he was not authorized to share the evidence, said he didn’t speak with investigators.

“I took steps to ensure a call from any person at the NFL wouldn’t be traced back to me and I was never contacted by the team of investigators hired by the NFL to investigate the NFL,” he said. “I still don’t know who confirmed receiving the video and I don’t know what that person did with it.”

“We have reviewed the report and stand by our original reporting,” said Kathleen

Carroll, the AP’s executive editor.

“The Mueller team did ask us for source material and other newsgathering information, but we declined.”